On the one hand there is nothing quite like being wired into your fishing spots, when you know all about the best times and conditions to fish various locations, but on the other hand there is to me a huge thrill to be had from fishing new ground. I love it. I used to spend so much time when I was at uni in Plymouth doing nothing more than walking and exploring the south Devon coastline especially, and when we caught good fish from spots we had found and then fished, well the thrill was immense. I can vividly remember many years ago now a good friend taking me out to fish an "ultra-secret" ray mark in south Devon. We pulled up in my van and began to walk the almost hidden path to where we would bang a spike in, put a rope down and clamber the long path down to the rocks below - only for me to inform my mate that I had fished this exact spot the week before. "But how ?" he asked. Because I had been out walking and exploring and had literally stumbled upon the mark. It's part of fishing is it not ? Sure, I bet there are a few spots around the UK that have not been fished at some time or another, but I still maintain that in some parts of Ireland for example (and no doubt Scotland) there are countless locations that have never, ever seen an angler. I personally find this kind of thing incredibly exciting and it gives me lots of ideas and dreams for the future......................

I don't know how the conditions are where you live at the moment, but along the coastline here in south east Cornwall we are currently beset with a lot of mucky, dirty water that is hardly ideal for bass fishing with the lures. We might be close to the end of the year now, but I am convinced we still have some good lure fishing to come down here if we get some decent conditions. I wracked my brain and came up with an idea to go and fish some new ground yesterday morning that I had walked past one summer afternoon with my wife, and I have always remembered that it looked some pretty stunning lure fishing terrain. One of those places you promise yourself that you will get back to. I was hoping that with the winds we have had lately and the way the spot lies that we might find some cleanish water and even perhaps a bit of fizz.

OK, so it's the first time Mark and I have fished the spot, and as much as we pretty quickly concluded that the next time we would fish it on a completely different state of tide, we could not help but be blown away by the ground. The place seems to have everything you could want for bass fishing, and I would also imagine it's crawling with wrasse as well. We want perfect fishing conditions all the time, but it rather obviously ain't going to happen, and I have always thought that thinking out of the box a bit and coming up with some different ideas has to be a good thing in the long run. I caught a couple of pollack which seemed to behave more like bass (one came on a new lure that I was trying out for the first time, always a thrill) and I quickly dropped a Black Minnow into a likely looking bay to see if there were any wrasse around. Almost immediately I had a few wrasse bites and then snagged the sodding lure hard in the bottom !! I was not carrying wrasse gear and it was the only Black Minnow I had on me, but I will be back there soon to have a proper go at them. Mark had a pollack as well, and although we had no bass I am convinced that with the right conditions and tides that this place might just turn out to be a tidy little bass mark, and if my theory is right it could fish well when many other places around here are just about blown out. We shall see, but I will never, ever lose the thrill, the challenge and the sense of adventure involved in fishing new spots both here at home and around the world.

I have now fished a few times with this "budget" YGK G-soul X3 braid in the 20lb breaking strain that I blogged about the other day (see here) - I used it on the wrasse in the Isles of Scilly last week and I have now also used it with surface lures, shallow-divers, regular minnows and weightless soft plastics. I was in no way down on distance with my IMA Salt Skimmer for example when compared to a much more expensive 8-strand braid, and a 6'' DoLive Stick rigged weightless was flying out there like I know they do. I will keep on using it and in time generate some longer-term feelings about it, but for now I am really, really liking this YGK G-soul X3 3-strand "budget" braid. More to come of course..........